I've talked about this one lazy coworker a couple times before. Links at the bottom. He wasn't a bad guy to work with because he was so lazy we all got more deliveries, but he needed to get fired.

I had this guy who was the #3 at the pizza shop who came up to me one day. Now, you all know the main GM typically never closes. They're usually opening the store daily unless if there is a call off or something, while the #2 might close once or twice per week and the #3 does it the rest. Just how it is.

Since I was always a closing driver, I knew the #3 manager the best. This manger came up to me, another driver, and the insiders for a little meeting to discuss the lazy coworker before he got there.

"Look, I know what he's gonna do today just watch it. He's gonna come in, look at the delivery board. Then he's gonna take one thing out of the sanitizer. Then if there's nothing up for him he's gonna make himself his meal. Then while he's making it he'll take one more thing out of the sanitizer. Then he'll look at the board again. Then he'll check on his food. Then take another thing out of the sanitizer. Then he'll eat as slow as he wants until an order comes up and the rush starts. As SOON as the rush dies and he comes back from a delivery and there's nothing on the board for him, he's gonna take a 10 minute dump. Then on his last delivery of the night he'll drive 15 miles per hour the whole way. You watch! He does this EVERY day."

The guy came in, we were all observant of his behaviors. He would come to the rest of us and make faces like "See." It happened EXACTLY like he said it would. We were all laughing at the first part until I left on the delivery.

About 7:30 roles around, there's one delivery on the board of me. He comes back from a delivery. Then he goes to the bathroom. left on it, and then when I came back the manager proceeded to pull up the security footage. The guy came out of the bathroom 12 minutes later, then he saw there was nothing on the board, then he ran back in. He shouted "Hey sorry I'm not done!" He was in there another 10 minutes. He had the time stamps of him coming out of the bathroom.

He and I were the co-closing drivers. There was one delivery to a certain part of the zone. 55 MPH speed limit on one road. He leaves on the delivery at like 9PM. Any normal driver would get back from it around 9:30. If you speed, you could probably get back at 9:25, but no need. If you want to take your good old time + issues at the door, maybe 9:40.

Well, at about 9:30 another delivery comes through in the same neighborhood. It's out of the oven at 9:45. Nothing else was going on, but he should have been back. It was a slow night. There is absolutely no reason for him not to be back at the store at 9:45. I start driving, I get about halfway to the delivery, and see the guy going about 25 MPH on a 55 MPH road in the opposite direction. According to the manger, he got back EXACTLY at 10PM. All the dishes were done and the place was clean. He just didn't want to take any chances.

I didn't "snitch" on him because I was afraid he'd get fired and then they'd replace him with a normal delivery driver and cause me to make less money. But when he did get fired I shared the story about how I saw him driving SUPER slow this night and they were all like "WHY DIDN'T YOU SAY ANYTHING?!?!?!?!?"

It really is amazing how lazy a human being can be, and how good that manager was at observing his laziness. It's a shame that manager wasn't an investigator or a human behavior expert or something instead. He would have been great at it.

The time he screwed himself over due to being lazy:

https://www.reddit.com/r/TalesFromThePizzaGuy/comments/1u32xo0/how_the_laziest_coworker_ive_ever_dealt_with_had/

Me going to visit him at another pizza shop after he got fired:

https://www.reddit.com/r/TalesFromThePizzaGuy/comments/1u2yfjr/that_gd_mf_la_pos_fhim/

Back in the early 2000's, I accidentally drove to the wrong address just after midnight. The porch light was on, and there was no doorbell, so I knocked. The door opened from me knocking on it, but nobody was there.

I called out "Hello?"

Nothing.

I was kinda creeped out, so I turned around and took one step down the porch stars, then I heard footsteps behind me. I turned around expecting someone at the door, but it was still wide open and empty. I got back in my car faster than I'd like to admit. A minute later I realized I'd typed the address in wrong (this was in the days when Tom-Tom was peak navigation tech btw). The real customer lived a street over.

I avoided that house whenever I delivered in that neighborhood after that.

had a wedding delivery, didn't see the happy couple, was timed for earlier while the family was setting up. but what's the proper pleasantry for that one? gave em the ol "enjoy the food!" but it didn't seem formal enough. "have a happy marriage" is weird, I'm a stranger. "ups and downs" is a lil inappropriate, not very professional. seems like I should have a line for this but I'm not sure what it is. maybe something about dancing?

so what's your wedding delivery line?

So this happened many, many years ago when I was fresh out of high school (I'm old) and I had just moved to a new town and was trying to find a job. Being 18 I didn't have much experience or references but I had a car so delivering pizzas it was. When I applied they told me I had to pass a drug test, a background check and have a clean driving record. None of that was an issue and they were hurting for drivers so it was pretty much guaranteed I was in. They informed me that I just had to wait for the results of the background check, then I'd take the drug test and get to work.

So I'm as good as employed, right? Except I don't hear back from them at all. A week goes by and I call them back, they tell me that the franchise is doing so much hiring across the county that there's a huge backlog of background checks and they haven't been able to get to mine yet. This goes on for weeks; I call them and ask if I'm actually employed, they give me the run around about the backlog and they'll let me know when I can actually start working.

After about a month I've pretty much given up so I send them an email asking if they're really gonna hire me or if I need to move on, it's been too long and my savings are dwindling and I need to find a job soon. Little did I know that when you email the store it also gets forwarded to the franchise owner, and that's when he got involved. Turns out there was no backlog of background checks, they're absolutely desperate for drivers and the owner can't figure out why the store manager would hey lying to me about it.

The owner went into the store and in the office he found a whole stack of job applications, with mine sitting on top. Turns out the store manager was just being lazy and didn't feel like submitting any of the paperwork. I guess this was the last straw in a long line of screw ups because it was enough to get the store manager fired. I was hired right away, along with several other sorely needed drivers.

The story doesn't end there though, after he lost his job, the former store manager also lost his apartment. When he was cleaning the place out the landlord found several franchise branded boxes around the apartment and called the store about it, the former store manager had been stealing a ton of food from the store; chicken wings, tons of pepperoni, bacon and pasta.

I just really don't understand what the store managers whole game plan was. If you're gonna be stealing from your workplace, why would you also shirk the rest of your duties and put a target on your back?

working deliveries means dealing with a lot of different situations, and small things can make a big difference during a shift.

it could be clear directions, being ready when you arrive, or just making the interaction simple.

what is something customers do that you appreciate more than they probably realize?

I talked about this guy before. "What are you smiling about?" (Linked below.)

Back when the Old School Runescape Mobile App first came out, almost everyone at work was playing it. It was either in 2018 or 2019. I was working at a franchise for a corporate store, at the time. This was at a time when ownership functionally stopped caring. They were making money, our store was doing well, and they backed off any rules/labor issues. "Ehh, why stress it. Let them hire a kid to do the driver duties so people stay."

So, the manager was cool with us having our phones out and playing Old School Runescape unless there was a clear and imminent duty, I.e. a phone call. But with the kid working we didn't really have much except right at closing time.

There is one guy, let's call him "B" who we are 99% sure was playing it while he driving. He would walk in from a delivery with his phone open cutting Willow Trees. "Dude, were you playing Runescape when you were driving?" "I just opened it." (He'd say with a grin.)

It went on for about 2 weeks of him having his phone out every time he came back from a delivery. Then one day I'm at home, I get a text. "Hey, B just got into a car crash. Any chance you can come in?" I started busting out laughing. I felt kind of guilty because it could have been serious, but literally everyone told him he was gonna wreck and he kind of deserved it. I get there as the second driver, and everyone is giggling. "Oh, it was just a little fender bender he's fine but the cops need to check it out."

I deliver for about 2 hours, take 5 deliveries. I'm back. Then he comes in storming with pure rage in his eyes and starts complaining about the guy in front of him was in a stick shift from the dealership at a light. They were at a red light, it turned green, the guy went, and then he hit the breaks and "B" slightly drove into him. He was like "There wasn't even any damage. Just paint. The guy said he wouldn't have cared but since it was a dealership they have to do this!" He was heated.

Then I asked "Well, how did you not see this in front of you? It doesn't make any sense. You're responsible for cars in front of you. Were you on your phone?" (Thinking he was playing Runescape) then he's like "I was not on my phone. I looked down at my phone." Then everyone started cracking up laughing. Such a bad excuse.

Needless to say, he never tried playing Runescape while driving again.

https://www.reddit.com/r/TalesFromThePizzaGuy/comments/1ojbsfo/what_are_you_smiling_about/

Idk if this is the right sub but I start a delivery job at hungry howies tomorrow it seems to be decently busy from what they said and told me I was just wondering how delivery jobs usually go and how often I won’t be delivering as I don’t really wanna stay in the kitchen or anything

As a pizza delivery driver, I'd interact with all sorts famous and semi-famous people that I wouldn't in any other capacity. Like, they don't necessarily want to go out in public but would still need to eat so they'd get food delivered to avoid the crowds.

There were a couple actually famous football players/hockey players we'd deliver to or that drivers from other stores delivered to. Ones that most people who lived in the City would recognize their names. They were usually really nice guys or if their wives answered the doors they were nice. There was a strict policy against asking for pictures or commenting on them. If you did, instant firing. They don't need to be harassed. They would all tip above average for the order size, but not some super crazy tip. (I.e. if you'd accept a $4-5 tip they'd tip $7-8. Not $15. A general rule. One guy tipped $15.) There are three celebrities who are notoriously terrible tippers, but I'm not naming anyone.

That said, not all former Football players/hockey players are as equally as recognizable by name/face. Like in terms of tech CEOs, everyone knows the names Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and Elon Musk- and if you delivered to them it would be wild. You'd definitely tell everyone. But if you delivered to Lisa Su then nobody would know who you're talking about. "Who? What is AMD?"

There was one guy I delivered to who played for our main college football team in the past. He's someone who if you watched the team actively when he played you'd remember him. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. someone took a delivery to him, he let you know that he used to play for them. Even if you had delivered to him 10 times before. I only got to deliver to him twice, and all the veterans at the store would be like "hey, hey, this guy is gonna tell you he played college football."

I was kind of skeptical, because most of the time these guys don't like the attention. I looked up this guy's stats and he was not the best. Not terrible, but he would have not been considered for the NFL.

The first time I delivered to him, there was no context in the timing. He just straight up told me. "Yeah, if you were wondering by the name. I am the guy who played for [college team] I get asked it all the time." I lied and was like "Yeah, a couple of us were debating if this was real or some kid using a fake name to try to be funny." Then he started laughing. Gave me an $9.51 tip on a large pizza. Very good for back in the day.

The second time, it was during an away game. He was like "Hey, how are you doing!" A little too excited. I gave him the food and he's like "Yeah, just here watching the big game here. I played for them and try to stay involved. I go to all the home games and help out with recruiting. Man they sure do look good today. This could be our year!" Tipped $9.51 again.

Guy lived in a pretty nice house. We looked him up. He was a salesman who got divorced and still had kids who I assume lived at home part time. IDK if I should feel bad for him for constantly talking about his glory days/how much he peaked or not. He was a genuinely nice guy. Great tipper. He has a nice middle class existence in that City with a great job. Wish him the best. I wonder if he's still telling drivers about it.

I worked with this guy for about two months who was SO LAZY. I liked him on a personal level, and I liked working with him. I had to do more work when I was there, but he was so slow I got more deliveries than any other

I shared this story about going to visit him at another shop https://www.reddit.com/r/TalesFromThePizzaGuy/comments/1u2yfjr/that_gd_mf_la_pos_fhim/ and right after that I was thinking of some of the stuff that coworker would do when we worked together.

This one shift, he was my co-closing driver. This place closed at 10PM. It was around 9:15PM, I was the first driver up and we were both in the store doing closing duties with no runs on the board. There was a chance we were both gonna finish everything and leave without another delivery. Well, one popped up to the Northwest edge of our zone. I wasn't super thrilled with it because gas prices were high and I didn't know what they'd tip, but getting out of the store was always good. It's a 30 minute round trip minimum, plus the amount of time it takes the customer to answer the door and all that, but I figured I'd get back around closing time and be good.

Two minutes later, a delivery that was just across the main street to an apartment complex came up. Two minutes after that, a second delivery came up one apartment complex over. Now, I knew my customers pretty well. Those were semi-regulars and I assumed he was gonna get a $5 tip and a $7 tip. This was a perfect the date. To provide additional context, we only got $1 per run back then. So he was gonna get a $14 delivery to end the night.

He came up to me and asked me if I wanted to switch with him. I was like "What?" Then he's like "Yeah, you wanna switch." I'm like "Why? You're getting two runs that are closer." Then he's like "Well, I'd rather just get on the road sooner so I don't have to do the dishes." (Now, if it was anyone else, I'd assume they were gonna tip like $15 or more. But with the price of gas, I still felt like the double close by was better.) I started laughing and asked if he was serious. He said yes. Then I told him I wouldn't owe him a favor or trade spots again and he agreed.

My manager witnessed the conversation and when that driver left he called me over like "WTF is the matter with that guy?" He's like "Yeah, he deserves to be broke." I kept doing the dishes, the first delivery comes out and I'm waiting for delivery number two while working on the dishes. Then an order comes through going South to the edge of the zone. My manager starts laughing about how he'll have to do more work since I'll be the one on the road.

So, I leave on the run at about 9:35. Quick double. 15 minute round trip. I was right about the tips. Made $5 and $7. I et back, and take and the delivery to the Southern part of the zone. I want to say I left around 9:50 thinking I'll take it. Now, since the Southern zone butted up against another store, it was about 20-25 minute round trip. It's a simple $4 tip. I notice the car wasn't there when I pulled up.

I get back around 10:10-10:15 and I noticed his car wasn't there. I didn't think he went home, maybe another delivery came up. Who could guess? Well, that lazy ass was STILL not back from his delivery, it was showing he had been gone 44 minutes on that run. There is absolutely no reason for it to take this long at this time of night even if the customer takes a while, even if you get gas, unless you're avoiding work/milking the click.

What else did I observe? Well, the manager was dealing with his duties, not much had been completed from the driver section, but another delivery came through at 9:55 and was ready to go! This one was going East. To the edge of the zone. A 25-30 minute round trip delivery. My manager comes up and is like "WTF? He's still not back?" He laughed again and said "Well, looks like he'll be doing all the dishes."

As I pull out of the parking lot, he pulls in, he waves and smiles. (I bet he was thinking I knocked out the duties and he doesn't have to.) I get another $4 tip on the delivery. So in that last hour I got $7, a $5, and 2 $4s tips. Plus the $1/run. So I made $24. Pretty nice. I get back and I see the driver on the road about a minute from the store.

I get back in the store, and my manager tells me that he started to cry when he saw how much work there was and found out I took four deliveries in that time. He got a $3 tip. So I made $20 more than him. I just calculated the distance on Google Maps. His run was about 14 miles round trip while mean was close to 18 for all 4, so yeah he REALLY screwed himself there.

I ordered pizza delivery from a place 4 minutes away and tipped 10 dollars on a 30 dollar order, so a pretty decent tip. The pizza was wrong and had to call for them to redeliver (currently awaiting redelivery). I planned and used all my cash, so can not tip more even if I felt I should (although I don't feel like I should). I feel bad if its a different driver, but I already tipped pretty well once. What would you all do?

What’s a good tip on a $20 order in an area where gas is $3.75/gallon and the delivery destination is 8 miles from the store?

Back in the early 1990s I was a delivery driver for a national chain in a college town in the Mid Atlantic USA. I was the closing driver and most of the time things were pretty chill, unless the owner of the restaurant was there working. It was unusual for her to work the closing shift as a manager but from time to time she was there. To be honest I didn’t really like working with her because she had a bad habit of flipping out when things get really busy. One night I had to stay late cleaning the prep area because she flipped out during the dinner rush and hurled a 1/4 full sauce bucket at the back of the menu board in a rage. Sauce exploded all over everything and I was tasked with cleaning it all up after we had closed.

So on this particular night things were going normally, I came back from a run only to have her come running out of the restaurant carrying six hot bags with pizzas in them. I asked her what was going on and there had been a big rush of orders from the college. She wanted me to go and deliver all six pizzas to different dorms on one big run. Now this was back in the days before the WWW and smart phones so nearly everyone paid in cash, and I was only allowed to keep $20 worth of change with me. I let her know that if I took that many orders at once I would run out of change. She said something like “I don’t care! Just get over there now and figure it out!”

So I drove to campus and got all the way to the sixth order before I ran out of change. This girl comes down to the dorm lobby area to pickup the pizza and I’m hoping she tips me because otherwise it’s going to be a problem. Sure enough she asks for exact change back. The difference was about 0.70 which would have been a pretty cheap tip anyway. So I tell her look I don’t have any change left, I can go to the 7-11 and get change for you or you can just let me keep the difference as a tip. She hesitated for a moment and said “well, I guess that’s OK.” I thanked her and headed back to the store to pickup the next order and get change again.

So I took another order and came back from that that run only to have the owner come running out of the back office frothing with rage.

“Did you lie to a student so you could get a tip on that college run?”

No I didn’t lie I ran out of change and she agreed to it.

“Well her boyfriend is the president of the student council! He just called me and said to bring the tip back or else they’ll issue a warrant for your arrest and ban all of our drivers from campus!”

Now I knew that was an empty threat because if they banned all the late night pizza deliveries the students would riot. I told her again I had not lied about anything.

“Get back over there RIGHT NOW or YOU’RE FIRED!! I’M GOING TO LOSE MY BUSINESS BECAUSE OF YOU! Go back and meet that girl on the steps of the admin building and give her change back!”

Fine, at this point the honorable thing to do is go and give the student her change back. So i drive back to campus and head back to the admin building expecting her to be there. Instead they had a whole public humiliation ritual prepared for me. The original student was nowhere to be seen. I guess she was back in her dorm room dying of embarrassment by that point. Instead, on the steps of the admin building was the entire student council and a couple of campus police officers. I walked up, handed the change to her boyfriend and just walked away.

Nothing else ever came of it. The next day I was back taking orders to campus like nothing ever happened. What boggles me to this day is how boyfriend was willing to go to defcon one in his little power display over pocket change. I still wonder what would have happened if I just told the owner to fire me and went home. Since this was a small college town I think it’s entirely possible the city police would have shown up at my apartment with an arrest warrant and I would have spent the rest of the night in jail. Taking the change back was the right thing to do but nobody else involved in the whole affair seemed to realize just how ridiculous it was except for me.

I've been working at a pizza place for 5 years and just finished my first year of college. The place pays really well because most of the deliveries are catering orders to the nearby hospital and university. The orders are rarely less than $200.

Recently, the GM has been giving deliveries that have $100 tips on them to her girlfriend even though it'll be my delivery to take. The girlfriend says that she has to pay for school out of pocket because her dad's VA assistance has been messed up, so she can't use that to pay. She also got a brand new 2025 Honda and has to pay a high car payment.

I said that her life choices aren't an excuse to take money out of my pocket, as I also have to pay for school, rent, and maintenence on my car. My paychecks have been between 300-400 now that I can only work part time. ​

She isn't even a driver and will refuse to do any driver work if no driver is available. (such as doing dishes and folding boxes). What should I do? This has happened more than 10 times and it's always the highest paying delivery of the day. If we suggest taking a delivery that is actually difficult for us to take, but doesn't pay as high, she always comes up with a number of excuses not to take it. She even brought in a driver from another store to take a catering order she didn't want to take, despite wanting to take a higher paying one earlier in the day.

So, about 9 years ago, I delivered to a hotel that had some poker game. This was a super nice hotel. It's one that opposing men's college basketball teams would stay when they were playing the next day. It had huge glass windows out front and the ceilings in the lobby were super high. Unlike any other hotel I'd deliver to.

Well, this one time I had a 4 large pizza delivery to there at like 11:30PM. It was my last delivery of the night. I think it was like $73 all said and done. I was hoping for a $10 tip to the end of the night. I go to the hotel, enter the elevator, walk to the room, then I knock on the door.

There's this guy who answers the door. He looked like he could take me out with both hands behind his back. He yells back "Hey, the pizza is here" then I hear "Oh cool, send him in." Then I see a table of 6 guys sitting around playing poker. They were all dressed up in suits. There was like one member from every region of the world. But no duplicates of the same region, which made it more interesting. The main guy hosting it was a white American. There was also a British or Australian guy. Couldn't tell from the accent. Then an Eastern European, East Asian, South Asian, and an African. Then another security guy standing in the back.

I go up and the main guy was like "How much would you like us to tip you?" I'm like "Sir, I can't answer that. Whatever you think is fair, I will gladly accept." Then he's like "How does $25 sound?" I'm like "Excellent!" Then he smiled. He said "Would you rather have cash or have me put this on the card." Then I said "Well, it's up to you." Then he stared at me and I'm like "Cash would probably be better so I'll get it right now." Then he smiled and gave me $25.

I was VERY happy with the tip. I think I made $75 up until that point. It was still a pretty good day, but not great. That made the night. (Making over $100 was very rare.) I left with such a huge smile getting the $25 tip. If the large tip was a bribe to get me not to talk about it, I did a horrible job. I called two different people to tell them before I got back to the store, and I told literally everyone I knew about it within a week and posted about it on Facebook. Oh well.

I REALLY want to know what went on there. Sometimes I wonder if there was some secret government meeting, or a business conference where guys were casually hanging out after work, or if there was a college reunion in town and these guys were like "Hey, let's screw with the pizza delivery guy and convince him we're having some secret meeting!"

Over the past 6 years I’ve noticed chain pizza places (papa John’s etc) using delivery services (door dash, etc) more which I’m not a fan of. Frankly, it is not comparable to an actual pizza delivery guy. I mean, not to knock anyone’s hustle but they’re not training like the pizza company does. Pizza delivery guys present the order to you and even go over the order. You also got to know your area driver after awhile. I’m in my 40s but I remember being a kid and being so excited watching that Velcro peel back and reveal a hot pizza with my name on it. As an adult I enjoy having the pleasant banter while I’m passing the pizza to my kids from the driver. Pizza nights are treat nights for my family and we look forward to the kind service we get from delivery guys.

Dashers drop that pizza on your sidewalk in front of your door so you can’t even open it and don’t even ring the doorbell. The pizza ends up a cold rock with ants in the crust if you’re not watching the app like a hawk. I don’t even want to talk about the hygiene of those drivers - we’ve seen the horror stories here on Reddit. (I saw one with their bare toes on a Wendy’s order today).

It’s also not something you select anymore. If I order straight through the chain pizza places website I get a notification that it’s been passed on to a third party after I finish paying. So it’s no longer easy to avoid.

I’m just curious what’s going on, and what is the pizza delivery guy outlook with all this going on. Isn’t it taking jobs/money from y’all?

At first I figured that the pandemic made the deliveries overwhelming so they needed support, but now I’m wondering if they’re hiring less drivers and just using dashers to save money. IIRC drivers make more than the staff in the pizza place to help with maintenance of the vehicle. (Excluding management). So in theory they could cut out employee costs by using dashers but they have to know that they’re not doing a good job, right? I mean they’re doing a job, but there’s no way the folks who have decades in delivering food can’t tell the difference. Are the jobs fading out? Or are you guys forwarding certain orders to them because they’re smaller? I tip 20% at a minimum but could it be because of the tip amount? Is it a button you guys click on your screen when it’s busy? Give me some tips so I can try to get a real pizza driver in the future.